Wednesday, August 23, 2017

Over the past four months, Kennedy said MLB has encouraged teams to exchange ideas about ways to promote inclusion and stamp out intolerance.

“There’s not been any directive or mandate, but there’s been support from the commissioner’s office for sharing ideas and looking at different policies and procedures,” Kennedy said. “I actually think most clubs have a zero-tolerance policy with respect to fan enjoyment and creating a safe environment.”

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As #1 notes a version of this is probably in place already at every park so this is more about PR than anything else. Still, I think it's a good message to send.

I suspect Jim was being a bit tongue in cheek with the "Yankees Suck" question but to me that's the challenging one. It's easy when a small group of chucklefucks break out the racist slurs or do something similarly asinine. Dealing with it on a stadium wide level is considerably more challenging. What happens when a call goes against a team in a big game and 40,000 people are chanting "bullshit! bullshit!" We are seeing this in soccer, FIFA, CONCACAF and now the USSF are having to deal with "puto!" chants on goal kicks. We've seen games played behind closed doors (Croatia comes to mind) but does MLB have the ability/willingness to do that on such things?

My guess is that "Yankees Suck" or "Bullshit" will generate reminders to behave and nothing more.

Dealing with it on a stadium wide level is considerably more challenging. What happens when a call goes against a team in a big game and 40,000 people are chanting "bullshit! bullshit!" We are seeing this in soccer, FIFA, CONCACAF and now the USSF are having to deal with "puto!" chants on goal kicks. We've seen games played behind closed doors (Croatia comes to mind) but does MLB have the ability/willingness to do that on such things?